I'm of a similar mind. Defensive adjustments were key for the Heat. JVG should take a note. Be willing to mix in some zone defenses instead of simply collapsing into the lane and leaving guys wide open or allowing the guards to be beat on the perimeter man on man.
There are not what ifs for Juwan Howard. Not known for a dependable playoff performer. Juwan's health isnt even a factor. I would say Sura's heath was bigger factor than Juwan's. Its about Tmac and Yao.
Good post. Riles is some kind of motivator. In that department, he's better than Phil Jackson, Pop or Larry Brown. He's part intimidator, part button-pusher, part taskmaster. He's one of those guys that even today's athletes snap to it just because he says it. Udonis Haslem did a great Horace Grant imitation with that midrange jumper. In fact yesterday, he was better than Grant. If Haslem can keep doing that, he will be a great complimentary player for years to come.
We saw how Antoine Walker took over the 3rd quarter last night. We saw Haslam knock down the midranged jumpers again and again and grab the tough rebounds last night. We saw Zo block everything near the basket and make contribution offensively when Shaq was sitting last night. We saw Payton hit the big shots down the stretch in the game 3 and game 5. We saw they also have Williams and Posey who are legitimate starters on a NBA team. I don't think we need to mention the names of Wade, Shaq, Yao and Tmac when we try to tell the difference between these two teams.
Very good point.... And I might add that the Heat got physical with the Mavs and the Rockets did not. In pure Pat Riley style, his team just beat up the other teams players. By game 6 Dirk was so shell shocked from getting whacked and banged around the he just curled up into a little ball for most of the game and dissappeared. Same goes for the rest of the players, where did all the slashing to the basket go? If you noticed it was reduced game by game starting with #3 in Miami in the second half. AND I LOVE IT! This is exactly why Bob Sura is so good for our team. JVG has said our team needs the player who will smack you to the floor with the hard foul and then kick you in the ribs when the refs aren't looking, basically play with an attitude. Just my humble opinion...
The one comparison that came to my mind straight away after the Heat came back from 13 down in the 4th Qtr in Game 3 was the Houston Dallas series last year. The Rockets were up 8 in the 4th Qtr in the Game 3 of the series and lost the game and eventually lost the series. Samething happened here, Heat won game 3 and gained the momentum and took care of the Mavs.
or the other 3 people playing on our team other than yao and tmac didnt know how to make shots. in order for any system to work..dont matter Spurs', or Suns..you gotta make shots. when u miss shots..all the ugly show up.
This was a big difference. Riley went to a zone to take away the quickness advantage that Dallas had. I don't remember the Rockets ever going to a zone in that series.
No way. Last year's Yao is better than this year's Shaq. Yao scored 30+ pt's 3 times whilst shaq failed to score 20 pts during the entire series. Heats won because their players outside of their big two, wade and shaq, are just much better than any of last year's rocket players outside of yao and mac.
If you read my post more carefully, I was talking about their defense... not their offense. I'm saying that the reason why Miami was more successful against Dallas than we were was because their overall lineup was able to stop the Mavs more than we were... mainly due to their increased athleticism at virtually every position. I do believe that Yao is light years ahead offensively... but from a defensive standpoint, they're still about even.
So true! There reason we lost to Dallas (I have thought about this a lot b/c I think this Heat team is made like our Rockets team in that they depend on old school basketball and not the new run and gun small ball) was a combination of the Rocket's coaching staff being out coached, the Rockets playing with only four players on offense, the refs and the lack of schooters around our stars. First off, once Van Horn went down and Dallas went to playing small ball, Van Gundy and his staff just got out coached. Its not completely their fault since our team did not have the most athletic players, but they should have done something to contain or slow down the guards. Secondly, RyBo did a great job overall in the series chasing and guarding Dirk, but he killed us on the other side of the floor. Dallas was not even trying to guard him and with the rule changes, Yao and TMac were doubled and had a tougher job. If he had made any shots, we might have had a better chance. Dallas in the Finals got the same treatment that we got in our series against them. The refs just gave the other team the calls. Wade was driving and getting to the lane, and getting the calls. The Dallas guards did the same thing to us last year. And finally, we couldn't stretch the floor to eaze up the double team on Yao or open the floor for Tmac. Thats what Haslem did in the Finals for Wade. He and Walker and Payton and Posey were all able to hit jumpers and open the floor up. This made it easier for Wade to just attack. Our shooters just started missing.
In that series, we lost by 4, 4, 4, and then 40. People tend to obsess over the disaster of game 7 but forget that even making it to that game was a very narrow thing for Dallas. With Juwan's offensive production and his terrific rebounding in the second half of that season, I think we would have easily won a couple of those 4-point games, and the series would have been ours. It might even have been a sweep, because we were up 2-0 before even playing the first game at home. So yes, I think Juwan's loss was a huge blow to us. What burns me up still is that we could have gone much further if we had survived the Mavs. We matched up very well against the Spurs that year; and after the Spurs, there would have been no limit for us. As David Wesley said with a month left in the season, "Who says we can't win it all?" Juwan's injury really hurt us, it really did.
